Ditching Aukus would harm US, close ally tells Trump
A close ally of Donald Trump has urged the US president not to ditch the Aukus programme after the Pentagon said it was reviewing collaboration on submarines with the UK and Australia.
Glenn Youngkin, the Republican governor of Virginia, said he hoped shipbuilders in his state would 'have a chance' to continue to 'build for our allies' and played down the chance of the project being scrapped.
The Pentagon is currently reviewing Aukus, a trilateral security partnership between Australia, the UK and the US, involving collaboration on submarines, AI and quantum technology that is worth £176 billion over 30 years.
The programme was previously considered a pillar of Washington security policy, but came under review shortly after Mr Trump took office in January.
The US government was examining it as 'part of ensuring that this initiative of the previous administration is aligned with the president's 'America first' agenda', a Pentagon official confirmed last week.
But Sir Keir Starmer said at the G7 summit in Canada earlier this week that he did not have 'any doubt' that Aukus would 'progress'.
Mr Youngkin, who visited London on Wednesday for a ceremony to unveil a restored statue of George Washington in Trafalgar Square, acknowledged that ending the programme would harm shipbuilders in his state.
'Our militaries have not only integrated and executed very well together over centuries, but I also believe that the sharing of technology has been really important,' he told The Telegraph.
Newport News Shipbuilding, a company in Virginia, is involved in manufacturing submarines for the project, while Lockheed Martin, which builds the missiles used by the submarines, has a major site in the state's city of Manassas.
'We build a lot of submarines and, in fact, build a part of every submarine in the US military,' he said. 'We, of course, would like to be able to build more submarines, and so I hope we have a chance to do so.'
He added that while 'long-standing policies occasionally have to be reviewed', the latest assessment of Aukus was 'just a matter of stepping back and looking at shipbuilding capacity'.
Mr Youngkin, tipped as a future presidential contender, shocked political observers when he won the 2021 gubernatorial race in Virginia - a state Joe Biden won in the previous year's presidential election.
In the 2024 presidential race, he acted as a surrogate for the Trump campaign in the state, although it was won by a 5.8 per cent margin by Kamala Harris.
The Aukus programme has become a major part of the 'special relationship' between the UK and US since it was announced by Mr Biden and Boris Johnson in 2021.
It is designed to boost Western power in the Indo-Pacific region and contains two 'pillars', the first of which is to help Australia obtain nuclear-powered attack submarines.
The three countries announced in 2023 that a new nuclear-powered submarine class would be built in the UK and Australia, while the US will sell Australia three second-hand Virginia-class submarines in the early 2030s.
The second pillar of the agreement allows for collaboration between the three countries on six technologies, including AI, quantum computing, hypersonic missiles and electronic warfare.
However, the idea has previously been opposed by Elbridge Colby, a senior Pentagon official appointed by Mr Trump, who said that the US should not give away 'crown jewel assets' like nuclear submarines.
Mr Colby is leading the review to ensure that all Pentagon-backed programmes are aligned with Mr Trump's 'America First' policy.
Mr Youngkin also told The Telegraph that the UK's unwillingness to directly defend Israel from Iranian attacks would not damage its relationship with the US.
'There is a recognition that the actions that right now are resulting in real violence around the world need to be resolved, and the way they're going to be resolved is through strength,' he said.
'I'm hopeful that President Trump's urging of everyone coming to the table and settling this is clear, but also the fact that the UK…while it has taken a different tone, is still very much one of our closest allies.'
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